20 ECONOMICS OF FORESTRY. 



influencing the water stages of rivers, and its 

 possible relation to the local climatic conditions, 

 preeminently renders it an object of government 

 consideration. 



Here the general principle of the Roman law, 

 Utere tuo ne alterum noceas, prevention of the ob- 

 noxious use of private property, readily establishes 

 the propriety of state interference, and by alterum 

 we are to understand, not only the other citizen of 

 the present, but of the future as well. 



We will see, that the forest resource is one which, 

 under the active competition of private enterprise, 

 is apt to deteriorate, and in its deterioration to 

 affect other conditions of material existence unfa- 

 vorably ; that the maintenance of continued sup- 

 plies as well as of favorable conditions is possible 

 only under the supervision of permanent institu- 

 tions with whom present profit is not the only 

 motive. It calls preeminently for the exercise of 

 the providential functions of the state to counter- 

 act the destructive tendencies of private exploita- 

 tion. 



